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The Origins of Shame

The YouTube video below was brought to my attention by a long-term client who also happens to be an excellent therapist and works extensively with concepts of shame in her own practice. It's fascinating, informative and provides a neurological basis for an understanding of the kind of shame that I write about. The primary lecturer, Allan Schore, and the other researchers don't discuss shame, in particular—they approach this topic from the perspective of attachment theory; but as you'll see, their explanation of neurological development in the infant helps us understand how an early and deep-seated shame takes root.

You're no doubt familiar with the nature vs. nurture debate concerning the relative importance of heredity and the environment. Nowadays, the prevailing view seems to be that it's neither one nor the other but an interaction between the two that defines us. Even so, most people assume that you are born into the world with your complete genetic makeup and that you then interact with your environment. The primary lecturer in this video—Allan Schore, a member of the clinical faculty of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at UCLA—challenges this view:

"One of the great fallacies that many scientists have is that everything that is before birth is genetic and that everything that is after birth is learned. This is not the case." He goes on to explain that there is much more genetic material in the brain at ten months than at birth. Only the brain stem or "primitive brain" is "well advanced" at birth; the rest of the brain continues to unfold and develop for the next two years as neurons become myelinated and interconnect. This development does not occur in an automatic and predetermined way; rather, it is powerfully affected by the environment, in particular by interactions and relationships with the primary caretakers.

It's a more nuanced view of the nature vs. nurture debate. Not only is it nature and nurture, as most of us already believe; an individual's particular genetic makeup (nature) also continues to evolve during the first two years of life under the influence of the environment (nurture). In other words, what happens to you, emotionally and psychologically, during those first two years, and especially in the first nine months of life, will powerfully influence your neurobiological development, determining how your brain takes shape in lasting ways. Most important among the brain parts that develop during these early months are those that involve the "emotional and social functioning of the child." And if those parts of the brain are to develop appropriately, "certain experiences are needed. Those experiences are embedded in the relationship between the caretaker and the infant."

At about the 5:45-minute mark in the video, Schore makes the following statement: "there's something necessary...that the human brain needs in terms of other human contact, for it to grow. It's a 'use it or lose it' situation. Cells that fire together, wire together. Cells that do not, die together." The idea is related to the notion of critical periods: organisms have a heightened sensitivity to certain environmental sitimuli during specific periods of their development. If the organism does not receive appropriate stimuli during this critical period, it may never develop certain functions, or develop them with great difficulty or in limited ways.

So what is Schore telling us? If an infant doesn't receive the kind of emotional interactions it needs from its caretakers during the early months of life, its brain won't develop normally. Certain neurons that should have interconnected will instead die. "Use it or lose it"—if you don't get what you need during those first two years, that experience will affect you for life. As my own client translates it, this means "brain damage." You might be able to modify that damage with a lot of hard work, but neuroplasticity has its limits. You will never be the person you might have been if you'd gotten what you needed during that critical period of emotional development.

A deeply sobering thought. You can call it what you like—bad parenting, failure of attunement, insecure attachment—but when things go wrong between parent and child in the first two years of life, you are permanently damaged by it in ways that cannot be entirely erased. The awareness that you are damaged, the felt knowledge that you didn't get what you needed and that as a result, your emotional development has been warped and stunted in profound ways—this is what I refer to as basic shame. The concept lies at the heart of the work I do.

Schore's view invalidates the simplistic theory that mental illness is the result of a chemical imbalance in your brain. It's not that you lack sufficient serotonin in your neural synapses; rather, the existence or lack of certain neurons, and the interconnections between them, has been permanently altered by failures of attachment during the first two years of life. You can't fix that with a drug. Cognitive-behavior therapy might teach you some useful techniques for coping with your damage but it won't make you into a different person. You'll never be just like the person who went through the emotional experiences she needed during that critical period.

Two other lecturers in this video link the experience of secure attachment during this critical period to the development of both a fundamental sense of self-esteem and the ability to feel empathy for others. The relationship to shame and narcissistic defenses against it is implicit. Either you get what you need from your caretakers during those early months and your brain develops in such a way that you have a fundamental self-confidence and security in the world; or you don't get what you need and the residue—the neurological damage—is basic shame. Either your caretakers are emotionally attuned to you and you develop (neurologically) the capacity to empathize with other people; or those caretakers let you down and as a result, your constant struggle for a sense of your own worth and importance powerfully limits your ability to empathize with other people.

Near the end of the video, Schore stresses the importance of joy in the attachment experience—that is, the infant's attunement with its mother in the experience of her joy and interest in her baby is crucial for optimal development. If you don't have that experience, if you don't feel that your mother experiences joy in your presence and finds you beautiful—it will permanently damage your brain as it develops. In an earlier post on my website, After Psychotherapy, I wrote that the baby whose mother doesn't adore it (or feel profound joy and interest in her baby) "never gets over it, not really." Now I can say why: it's because the neurological development of its brain was permanently altered by the failure to get what was needed during the first year of life.

This has some of the most profound implications, both on an individual and on a societal level. This knowledge needs to be shared with every new and expectant parent, because the stakes are so high. Often, parents are still being given information that is incongruent with this research by their physicians, family, and friends. New parents are especially vulnerable to misinformation because they are naturally looking to authority figures for wisdom as they navigate early parenting. One of my favorite sites for parenting styles that support optimal emotional and neurological development is www.ahaparenting.com. It has given me a lot of confidence in my decisions and parenting style, which is very much in line with this research. Thanks for the great blog!

"Either your caretakers are emotionally attuned to you and you develop (neurologically) the capacity to empathize with other people; or those caretakers let you down and as a result, your constant struggle for a sense of your own worth and importance powerfully limits your ability to empathize with other people."

Sad, but true. If I'm in a more pessimistic mood, it also seems to me that it gets worse over the generations. At least, it seems to be that way in my extended family. But there's also hope. People do grow, even without therapy, and some amazing people emerge from incredibly bleak childhoods.

When the double-bind theory was dismissed from treatment for schizophrenia other voices chimed in that mothers were tired of being blamed. The fact remains, however, that parenting and development begin at inception and a child who is unwanted and unloved will suffer the consequences.
It is a fine line in targeting mothers, as opposed to mothers and fathers, especially now when both parents are working out of the home (whether those parents are hetero or homosexual couples), or single parents, whether they've elected to be a single parent or not.
What can civilized, egalitarian parenting look like? Are we destined to always be animals?...reproducing for the sake of instinct? fear of death? social acceptance? altuistic love?
I continue to wonder why...why my neighbors bought a dog who spends 8 hours a day on the porch barking and alone...why young couples give birth to offspring and then spend upwards of $500 a week on infant daycare...

I have read many of your articles on the afterpsychotherapy website and they have been very informative and important for me to read. I understand the concept of basic shame. Understanding the origins of basic shame are important. There is a feeling of heaviness that I experienced as a child and teenager and now working through as a young adult of feeling less then and unworthy.... the feeling lingers like a tightness in the chest... I think this is basic shame. Sometimes the feeling passes like a wave while interacting with others. I want to say that I want to continue carrying hope that the affects from childhood (first 2 years) are not permanent and not view the interactions as having permanent damage. I would say defining "damage" is tricky. I remember reading a popular book on neuroplasticity and the author wrote how other parts of the brain take over and perform a missing function (in the adult brain). Maybe a similar process occurs as a person goes through long-term psychotherapy while interacting with the therapist...connections form and neurons already present take on new functions (functions of neurons that should have been saved and not lost during the first two years). I think there has to be room for hope to see how each individual finds ways to heal the basic shame. I want to see what happens as I go through long-term psychotherapy. There is an assumption that the lack of neurons and connections between them (the lost neurons from the first two years) lead to basic shame. Maybe the connections formed from the neurons that were left that lead to the basic shame response during the first two years are difficult to access and alter. Just as I have difficulty remembering my childhood because of the pain and shame, having had a traumatic experience(s) because of being emotionally overwhelmed. I am slowly remembering as I begin to feel my emotions. Maybe the experience was so traumatic for a a newborn that the mind prevents itself from accessing those feelings/responses because there is a buried belief that the mind can not handle this response (even though now it can as an adult). If there is a way to access the response/memories from the first two years...then the feelings can be integrated like a traumatic event. Maybe the mind of the newborn buries that experience so deeply that the feeling of shame/unworthiness from those first few years washes over as a response throughout ones life (there is difficulty integrating that unspoken experience from the first two years...I wonder what kind of an experience it is). Can this be called damage, though? I want to stay open to other explanations. I think I understand what you are saying though...maybe that feeling of basic shame lingers throughout ones life (is this what you are saying, by the way?). I think learning what one should have received takes hard work and doesn't come as easily. Healing from a lack of attunement and nurturing feels like slowly stepping out of a bubble you were in which you saw as the whole world. Projecting everything outward felt unbelievable lonely when I was a child and teenager. I have read articles about narcissism on psychologytoday where narcissism was equated with narcissus and how he fell in love with his own reflection, where narcissism is defined as exaggerated self-love. I do not think narcissus fell in love with his own reflection, I think he could not move from the position of seeing the world as his own reflection and wasted away in that position (staring at himself in the pool of water). Seeing the world as a reflection of oneself hides profound pain and shame.

I sometimes sound more pessimistic than I feel. I do believe in healing, but it's like any kind of healing where there has been a deep wound -- there is scar tissue. Sometimes the scar tissue is so extensive that it will limit functioning in certain ways BUT that doesn't mean enormous growth isn't possible. What I try to do in my writing is to counter the sentimental false belief that you can make everything as if that awful childhood never happened. You can't, but you can still grow in ways that are deeply meaningful and fulfilling and that lead to genuine self-esteem. That's the subject of the current book I'm writing.

Thanks for your thoughtful comments. I agree about Narcissus -- it has nothing to do with self-love.